Saturday, November 21, 2009

Messing with Windows 7 Themes

Though I still grab specific images for my desktop wallpaper, I have to confess, the standard sets of Microsoft-provided themes for Windows 7 are very nice. I particularly like the scenic ones.

However it was a drag having the images rotating on my desktop a bit limited. By default the stock themes only contain five to seven wallpapers. If I wanted to rotate to additional ones I had to switch to a different theme set.

Wouldn’t it be nice to have, say, just one theme with all the landscape/scenic themes? But how?

Easy.

Get your Theme Material

First I had to get the source material by downloading or identifying all the themes with wallpapers I wanted to use.

[How To] Add More Wallpapers to Existing Themes in Windows 7 - Windows 7 hacker post informs us that “…the default theme configuration files that come with Windows 7 are all located in c:\windows\resources\themes folder. You can find 6 of them there after you first installed Windows 7. But all wallpaper files are not saved in the same folder. Instead, you can find them in c:\windows\web\wallpaper folder, in each organized subfolder.”

(Note, you could easily add any additional images to this folder as well; these could be your own personal photos, other images downloaded from the net, whatever. You don’t have to stick with just these theme wallpapers.)

Additional Diving

For more tips and background on Windows themes and the format that drives them, you might find these posts good reference material.

Credits

Why this? It is the simple blog of a Last Exile fan and is intended to express the enjoyment we derive from studio Gonzo's production. Although we closely relate with those characters, we aren't them in real life. We just want to keep the memory of these incredible young kids alive. So go buy Gonzo's Last Exile DVD's!